The head of the National Ice Hockey League's players union, Bob Goodenow, has resigned just days after the NHL and the union resolved their long-running labor dispute.

Goodenow represented the players during the work stoppage which canceled the entire 2004-05 ice hockey season, the first time a labor dispute had scuttled an entire an American professional sports season.

In the new labor agreement, Goodenow was able to win a new free agency structure, but team owners got most of what they wanted. Of particular importance to the owners was a salary cap, which Goodenow fought hard against but could not stop. In the end, 87 percent of the players voted for the new deal.

Ted Saskin, the former director of the union's business affairs and licensing department, will replace Goodenow. Saskin was also directly involved in the labor negotiations.